HAPPY NEW YEAR!!

SO my goal is to really keep up with this. I would like to say a post a day with a picture but if five days a week is all I can manage that would be acceptable to me. Everyone asks what my resolutions are for the new year. I guess I am an odd duck, I think that everyday I give myself challenges to keep up with it. I guess for e it is the same. I would like to see us continue to learn with and thru each other. When he grows, I grow, and it is awesome to see and feel that everyday. If I have one goal for this year I think it would be that he learns to write his name, know his address, phone number, and know his letters and numbers. I think those are things that he is well within reach of even in the next few montehs. That is the great thing about relaxed learning, it ebs and flows with our life and what doesn't work today is always there for when he is ready. He truly knows how to learn and all I have to do is offer what he asks for.

Numbers are everywhere

He has really been into this number thing. Today he counted 16 cherrios on his own! He like to count everything. I love seeing him when the light bulb goes off!

The Number Game

I know to most this is nothing but to me it is alot. Easton is really been showing more and more interst in numbers the past few days. He counted up to eight on his own today and then back down while playing cars with Junah. When he got to four he said " four cars, almost like 5 nuggets." When I asked him if he had four cars and wanted five how many more cars would he need, " ONE!" is what he yelled! I was floored. I asked later when he had balls if he handed me two of his four how many would he have. He looked down, you could see the wheels spinning and then clarity, " TWO!" I was so proud of him but not as proud as he was of himself!
I was very concerned with the canceling of therapy today but it was a great day.

" You Spin Me Right Round Baby...."

So once again Easton has found a priceless toy in the new lazy susan. Oh how much fun this thing brings to him. We have taken this great play toy and used it to learn about centrifical force. He has fallen in love with this good ol' physics theory. He loves to watch things fly off from cups, to planes, to his own self! It is the simple things in life uh?
Also a HUGE leap today in numbers. He has never been the mathamatician, which is fine with me. But today at lunch he wanted nuggets. I poured them out and he aid he wanted two. "Well how about a few more, you are pretty hungry I think." When he saw the plate he said, " no mama, two, not five!" I was shocked, I went and looked, and there were five!

Catch Up

I feel bad for missing so much time and not keeping up. Being gone for a month was along time and I forgot my password once I got home I swear I am going to keep up more!
I think one of the best things we did while home on leave was go to the Chattahoochee Nature Center. The weather was perfect and we got to see so much cool stuff! We walked around the Beaver Pond, no beavers but lots of evidence of there whereabouts! We saw geese, fish under the water, and a great blue heron find his lunch. It was such a wonderful day. WE learned about roots and soil layers. how the geese migrate, the fish go up and down..... seeds and so many wonderful things!!! I could spend everyday like that! We also made pinecone bird feeders. I am going to have to make a bucnh to hang on the clothesline here this winter, might as well hang something on it and and make the birds happy to!

"Will it float"

I know that most everyone knows about David Lettermans favorite game, "will it float" and it is becoming one of Easton's favorites as well. While playing with the growing snowman he was pulled to the idea of seeing what all would sink. We took this occasion to learn about density and mass and surface area. He was having a great time getting SOAKED and learning as well. Once he heard that if something is heavy it has to have more surface area he started looking for things that would fit. It was a sight watching him run around to find things that would float and what all he found that he sought fitting. He had to have on his saftey goggles of course, " better safe than sorry" he likes to say!

Friends

One thing I love to watch the boys do is build relationships and friendships. Easton has had his friend Jonathan since before they were one. It is amazing to see them grow into true frieds. Once just playing side by side like the other wasn't there, to no that is MINE, to wonderful interactive imagintive play that has them working together and building stories as they go. It made my heart melt to see them together the other day, they truly are growing up!

I Have Been BAD!

Wanted to write everyday but it has been a whirlwind week! Wendsday was library day and it was about Pizza, but all E could think of and say was 'where are the firemen?" " where is the fire truck"... I think you get the picture. I think it is going to take a few weeks to undo the hype of the fireman!
Thurday we had therapy and he did great, but that was not the highlight of the day, it was the airshow practice that started that day. We heard them flying in the first round of planes that morning but unfortuntly it was raining so we could only hear them, not see them and that was unacceptable! We left about 45 minutes early for therapy so we could go sit at our spot on the flight line, he LOVED it, then after therpay we got to meet with our BFF's at the gym to play which was awesome, well until we heard the roar of more practice, that was all it took! All four of us were out there in a shot, I don't know who was more excited, the boys or there moms! I wish I had the camera, the moments with J and him were so sweet! Carolyn and I have done every airshow together with them and it is always so special. This year is the first year that the boys actually get it and are able to converse about it and it is so beautiful to see friendships blossom and grow in such young souls. As if the arial display wasn't enough, when I took e to the bathroom over at the 48th I had no clue that it was being used for Blue Angel Headquaters. I don't know who was more in star struck tizzy, me or him. He went CRAZY! it was awesome!

Needless to say he went to bed early with visons of fighter jet dancing in his head!

THis morning was very busy, we had his speech eval at 8 and then normal therapy at 9, and then the base opened there doors for mor airshow fun. I thought that today would be a good trial run since it wouldn't be busy at all. He was great! He got to marshall in the F16's LOVED that, got to get on a tank, see the Golden Knights, he thought that was VERY cool. WE learned alot about wind today. Before the troopers jump they drop a streamer to gauge wind things and we got to talk about that and then how the shutes worked, it was very cool!

Busy DAY!

SO today was NON STOP! WE went to the fair this morn for an hour or so and walked around. No rides this time, it was way to crowded and the ride set up...lets just say I am not one to trust a carnies take or faith in physics or trig. They were all uneven and not so safe looking. E loved watching it all and was great the whole time. It really was a treat. Came home, had some quiet time and then it was off to the fall party that a friend of Nicks was having. It was great, aside from the shiner he got when he was running and took a dive into a rock, good thing it was his check and not an inch higher... We got to go on a hay ride and he LOVED it, especially the goats he saw...if only we could have a goat. But when the fire was lit, that is when he got excited, thanks to the Big Dog, he is one pyromanic!

Number Fun

SO this morning E took it upon himslef to take out all the ritz from the sleeve and line them all up in a perfect line on the edge of the table. We counted them all out and then he wanted to take so many away and recount. It was funny how purposeful he was in it all. I think he is going to be like me when it comes to learning, seeing is believing.

More Fire Fun!

Well we got to go back today and it was just as great as yesterday, got to bring the camera to catch some action shots. We had such a blast. It was pretty funny though when the room was quiet as the fireman read a story and Junah needed to nurse so I moved across the room with him in eyesight of E, but still in the room, well a few minutes later Easton thought it would be a good time to shout out across the room. " Mama, why you nursing Junah NOW?!" Nice Easton!:) Then when we were outside for more water shooting fun he sees a lil girl with her mom and they have on McCain/Palin buttons, and this troubled E deeply. " MCCAIN<>

On a true educational front, this morning Easton was really digging letters. We read his letter book a few times in a row and did his two alphabet puzzles. On his own he got B, O, and E. I was shocked about the B because that is nowhere in his name or in alot of his words about space so I was thrilled. I am enjoying his interest in letters and reading since Nick and I both love to read so much and I have read so much to him it feels good to know that he has been listening. He loves to 'read' to us now as well as Junah, melts my heart.

What A Great Day!

SO I thought that this morning was awesome when we were cutting up an apple and he kinda got that the eight pieces put together made one. ( fractions) and then we talked about the seeds and how they turn into trees or flowers or anything like that. He thought this was very interesting. We laid them on a wet paper towl in a ziploc bag to see if they will sprout. With great gusto I announce that we are going to the library to find a book on Johnny Appleseed and maybe see a train but what did we arrive to? In honor of Fire Prevention Week the CFD was up there reading books about fireman during story hour. Then they all helped ( there was about 7 of them) the kids one on one with crafts that they brought. The real icing on the cake, they brought them all out to show off the engines and let them hold the hose, pull back the lever, and spray the chiefs car one by one.
Now this could have gone one or two ways and six monthes ago it would have been catastrophic, but today was amazing. He walked in calmly and soooo happy, sat down with the other kids, listened amazingly well. Followed the craft perfect, and held my hand happily the whole time outside. It made my heart soar to see him keep looking back at me with such awe and happiness. It was one of my favorite moments as a mom with him. I am so glad that I am going to be able to share these moments with him. If this had been at school I would have missed the wonder and excitment, yes I would have heard it but to see it in his own eyes as it played out was priceless! They are going to be back tommrow and I am bringing the camera and we are going again, I can't wait!

So it begins...

My goal right now is to make it through the day alive, and hopefully learn something along the way. First thing this morning we had a cool moment when we drove past a logging truck and seconds later the start of the framework for a new house. I got to explain how the trees cut down across the stree are put on those trucks and cut into pieces like the ones we saw at the homesite. When we got home I showed him how to find a stud and that the studs are like the bones of a house like what we saw going up. He thought it was all so cool. Also when we went to go see the planes take off we talked about the letter K since we were on Kilo Row and looked for K things around there.
I hope I can keep this excitment and enthusiasm about it all, I don't see how I can't as seeing him learn and the challenge to know the answers is awesome!

"Lets start at the very beginning....

a very good place to start", is what a wise person once sang. After much prayer, thought, talk and deliberation we decieded as a family today that we are going to keep Easton at home to learn. I hate saying 'at home' though as it makes it seem so stuffy and sedatary, and we will be far from that. I see much of our learning out and about, in the forest, at a stream, at the market, in day to day life. I enthusiasticly embrace this adventure and cannot wait to learn again with him in the ways that I did once when I was a child. I think the most treasured part of my childhood was learning outside the classroom in field trips and to think that everyday is going to be field trip day for us is very exciting. I cannot wait to see him blossom before us and soak up life with all it has to offer. I have to admit I am a bit intimitated by this venture but like all new and big things in life I think that shows how much it means to me. Now lets hope that he can spell better than I and learn to count to twenty with his shoes on!